


Medic’s Strength

by orphan_account



Category: Naruto
Genre: A growing up story, Alternate Universe, Fuck Canon, Gen, More additional tags to be added, No Uchiha Massacre, Red Light District, Sassy Haruno Sakura, Sassy Team 7, Yakuza, bc yES, no beta we die like men, we all need that
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-03
Updated: 2020-11-03
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:28:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27371200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Sakura’s dream has always been to become a medic, one even better than Tsunade. She manages to become one, yes - even though the four extra years of learning were hell, she did it.Now, a genin, Sakura has to navigate through her mother’s political plays, her new status as shinobi and all that comes with it.—Includes: “how tf did this happen” from everyone ranging from the author to the characters, sassy Sakura, mildly sassy narrator, and a lot of people hating on dinners.
Relationships: Dai-nana-han | Team 7 & Rookie Nine, Haruno Sakura & Hatake Kakashi, Haruno Sakura & Uchiha Sasuke & Uzumaki Naruto, Haruno Sakura & Yamanaka Ino, Minor and/or Background Relationships
Comments: 2
Kudos: 13
Collections: Nobleko’s Shelf of Their Fics





	Medic’s Strength

**Chapter I: Prologue**

Sakura stared at the hitai-ate in her hands. She did it. She actually did it!

It may have taken her nine years of basic Academy training, and then four years of pre-med training, but she did it! She graduated! She is now a shinobi of Konohagakure, even if just a genin!

"Saku-chan," Ino pouted after her rant about one thing or another went unheard. She was sitting next to Sakura on the stairs at the staff-only entrance at the back of the Yamanaka flower shop - the stairs the two used to meet at and talk for hours at ever since they first met.

"Get outta your head for a second! I know you're really happy about graduating — I am too! —, but jeez Saku."

Sakura elbowed her in return. "Let me have this moment, okay? I worked my ass off to become a med-nin—"

"Weeell, technically, you are only apprentice med-nin; you aren't the real deal yet," Ino interrupted her.

"True, but soon I'll get there!" Sakura responded.

"Yeah, true! I believe in you!" Ino said, a poor veil for her attempt at stealing Sakura's mochi that she had bought with her _hard earned money_ which she earned from working minor jobs around the Konoha Hospital.

"Oh yeah," Ino said after managing to steal a few of Sakura's mochi from her and promptly dodging Sakura's elbow. "Can't forget about apprenticeships. Have you got an offer for one yet?" She asked.

"No," Sakura said. "Not yet at least! I haven't even been assigned a team yet; so it's not like I don't have time. Oh! While at teams, who do you think you're going to be on a team with?" Sakura asked, then promptly ate the rest of her mochi that Ino hadn't stolen from her (hadn’t stolen _yet_ , Ino was _very_ capable of stealing her mochi from her own mouth, and she absolutely _would_ do so if it were not so _disgusting_.)

"Probably with Shikamaru and Chouji; the InoShikaCho trio of my father's gen was way too successful to not get repeated again. You?"

"Honestly, no idea." Sakura chuckled. "I guess that I'll probably be put on a team with the best graduate outta all, and the dead-last. Since: a) I graduated on top of the class at our school, and b) the chūnin who places graduates on teams is wayyy too predictable.”

She added. “As to be expected of our perfectionist Academy teach.”

Ino laughed. "Then~, do you know who graduated on top of all?" Ino asked her a question with an oh-so obvious answer that Sakura had to shake her head at it.

"Who other than the _beloved_ Sasuke," Sakura said, her voice - pure sarcasm. She used to have a puppy crush on the boy when she was still in Academy, but then she learned just how much of a dick the Uchiha was through the worst dinner she ever had; the Haruno, a clan full of civilian _merchants_ , were invited over for dinner by the Uchiha (for very questionable and mildly dumb reasons - three months after that happened and Sakura still doesn’t understand exactly _why_ the Haruno were invited) which were a clan full of _shinobi_. Her father really was as much of a dumbass as Sakura’s mother had him for, for he actually _accepted_ the invitation. Sakura, nor her mother, could understand _why_ he accepted it; the... relationship between shinobi and merchants wasn't the best. (It was bad at the best of times. No one really liked merchants.)

"Yeah. I'm jealous of you for having him on your team," Ino said.

"Don't be; he's a dick."

Ino sighed. "You know, I still don't understand how come your opinion on that guy changed in one night."

"One dinner!" Sakura corrected her.

Ino rolled her eyes. "At least tell me why you think he's such a dick. Or is it some super secret business stuff you can't talk about?" She then added. "Seriously, the people who say that shinobi keep way too many secrets have probably never met a merchant."

Sakura chuckled. "I'll explain it to you when I'll be able to."

"So, when you'll take up the clan head position," Ino said.

"Yep!" Sakura answered before popping the last of her mochi in her mouth, and discarding the now empty paper tray the mochi came in, in a near-by bin. "Something like that."

"Something like that?"

"It's complicated," Sakura shrugged and stood up. “Wanna go to Red?"

"Why do you like the fucking Red Light District so much?" Ino asked, before actually answering Sakura's question. "Yeah, sure - why not.”

"Maybe because my family comes from there. Maybe because I have friends there?" Sakura answered and asked in one.

Ino sighed and stood up too.

“Let’s go then!”

•

Sakura lounged comfortably on one of the couches in the back room of the “Flower Girls’ Hotel” (She could respect how far the sex workers of Red went to not label their “hotels” as what they were.) Ino was sitting next to her, talking with one of the workers here about village gossip. Ino may have played up the act of not liking the so-called “Red”, but she actually loved it. It gave her freedom (that was oh- _so_ obviously limited by social and cultural restraints), and it hurt Sakura seeing that Ino — no, the whole Yamanaka clan — played up the act of looking down upon Red’s residents.

(Sakura knew that most of the time with the Yamanaka liking the Red, the only actual reason for them liking it was the Red being full of nutcases. The Yamanaka were a clan that were specialised in human psychology; it was in their blood to pick apart someone’s mind. ~~**_It made sense then, why they hung around shinobi, Sakura thought._**~~ )

The calm of the room was interrupted only by the chatter of Ino and Sakura (not Haruno Sakura; a sex worker going by the nickname “Sakura” who’s real name actually was Mizuki) — Sakura was starting to get slowly lulled into sleep thanks to the two’s chatter —, when suddenly, someone kicked open the door.

“Mizu-chan, I done fucked; please hide me!” A boy with wild blonde hair and sapphire eyes — Naruto! Sakura realised — shouted to Mizuki.

Mizuki only sighed at that, closed the door Naruto almost kicked out, sat him down next to Sakura and Ino (he promptly then saw the homemade cookies and went into _fuck yeah, some good fucking food_ mode). Mizuki also activated a seal array etched into the walls of the room. She did all of those things as if it was a regular thing that happened. _Poor her, if this truly is a regular thing_ , Sakura thought.

As soon as Naruto stopped mowing through the cookies that Mizuki always made sure to have on the coffee table for guests, and realised that “yeah, I am not here alone”, he greeted them. “Hi Sakura! Hi Ino! I didn’t think you were the types to hang around these parts.”

Sakura actually liked the boy, she even used to sit next to him during physics in Academy (they both hated physics; so soon enough, the two became friends since the sharing of the mindset “why should they pay attention to a class I hate” is a great way of making friends, it seems), but she was mildly annoyed at being woken up from her semi-sleep.

Really, in hindsight, Naruto should’ve expected getting the plate which was just a second carrying all of Mizuki’s homemade cookies.

“What was that for?!” he said, dodging the projectile thrown at him by Sakura as Ino laughed at the shenanigans in the background.

“I was so comfy here, almost falling asleep, then you almost kicked the door of its hinges!” Sakura said as she repositioned herself - from having her head on Ino’s thighs to just sitting.

“Karma got to you!” Ino said, then promptly laughed her ass off.

When Naruto realised that the two were just kidding, he relaxed in his seat.

(Ino hated that his body expected a fight, that his fingers twitched in stress, that—

(That he was so good at hiding it.)

“Anyways,” Sakura — the sweetheart — said, probably sensing the short storm of emotions in Ino, “How did your graduation went?”

“Now, this is gonna be a long story,” Naruto said, donning his Really Serious Storyteller Face. “Get seated my friends, for I have a tale to tell.”

•

After they all said their goodbyes, each of them went home. Ino went to the north, north - the hill on which all of the clans built their compounds; Naruto to the south, south - deep in The Red, deeper into Konoha’s underbelly; and Sakura went to the west, west - the way the village was expanding in, west - the always busy newly made districts full of merchants, richer artists, businessmen and women.

Sakura loved all of Konoha, its winding streets, its architecture, districts, but if she were to choose the district that she liked the most — call her biased, it’s not like she cares — she would choose her own district.

She made her way through the people which were coming home from work, through those who were buying the last of groceries needed for dinner, through children who had to come home by six for dinner.

 _A city never sleeps,_ she thought.

And while Konoha prided itself on a united front of its people, its residents; it and most of its people never truly thought the merchant district and the Red to be true parts of it. Both of these districts were as if they were cities within a city; it made sense why the rest of Konoha thought them to be different - they _were_ different.

All while she was thinking, musing, Sakura hummed a song she previously heard on the radio; there was a lightness to her step as she made her way to the entrance to the Haruno clan’s house.

She walked inside her clan’s home, her home. She made sure to wave to the two yakuza her family hired to work as their guards, and made her way down the halls of her home. She almost forgot to take off her shinobi sandals (the servant who was in charge of cleaning the halls today would probably kill her if she brought the soil from her sandals anymore further into the house), so she made her way back to the hall and changed to the shoes she wore at home; one of the guards chuckled.

“Hitomi will kill you,” he said.

“Thanks for the warning, and fuck - Hitomi’s on floor duty?” Sakura truly was thankful for the man’s warning. Hitomi was the one who her mother entrusted with commanding the servants and she did so with an iron fist.

“How unladylike you are, heiress. “Fuck”? Your mother’s going to be disappointed!” The other guard piped in.

They all burst into laughter but calmed down soon enough, and Sakura then made her merry way to her room.

She resisted the urge to throw herself onto her bed; her clothes stank of cheap perfume and even cheaper wine (an unwanted gift from the Flower Hotel), so she first changed herself into a red qipao dress with slits on its sides and with a pattern of her clan’s symbol — an empty white circle — and into black leggings. She tied her hair up in a ponytail, and put her hitai-ate on.

She looked into the mirror. She realised that she didn’t like how the hitai-ate looked on her.

She tried using it as a necklace (it felt as a leash, even though she hadn’t made it tight), as a belt (it just felt weird - Sakura never really was the type to wear belts) and as several different things, but then she got tired of it. Who cares how she wore her hitai-ate?

She reverted back to her original way of wearing it — as a hair band —; she still didn’t like it.

She huffed in annoyance, and decided to actually do something productive; even if doing something productive was finally doing the thing she had been putting off for a while now - go and tell the news of her graduation to her mother.

She didn’t really know why exactly she had been putting it off ( _ **a lie**_ \- she exactly knew why; she really wasn’t feeling like getting into the politics and consequences of her graduation, and her mother was definitely going to do that).

She knocked on the door of the clan head’s office; Haruno Kei — her father — may have been the clan head on the papers, but Haruno Harumi — her mother — was the one actually ruling over the Haruno clan.

“Come in.” Sakura did come in and sat down before her mother who sat opposite to her at her desk.

“So,” she said after clearing her throat pointedly (it wasn’t as pointed as she wanted it to be; it never was with her mother), “I graduated.”

“Mhm,” her mother said, a hint of satisfaction showing in her voice, as she read through a letter she just finished writing and stamped it with the stamp of officiality every clan head had.

Sakura waited until her mother actually responded, but she didn’t seem like doing so anytime soon.

“Are you going to say anything about me graduating? Y’know, I graduated on top of my class,” Sakura said, annoyance (and disappointment) showing in her voice.

“I expected nothing other from you,” her mother said.

“Ah.” Sakura didn’t know if that was a compliment, or as just another dumb expectation her mother placed on her. After a while of deciding, she still stayed undecided on which one it was.

“Anyways,” her mother said putting down her pen and looking at her daughter, “do you know who you’re going to be placed on a team with?”

“Since I graduated on top of med,” her mother sent a sharp look at that - she didn’t like her using slang; Sakura however didn’t react, “and because my former Academy teacher — he’s the one who places us on teams —,” she added, “because he is a perfectionist, I’m probably going to be placed on team with the best graduate out of all and the dead last.”

“Do you know who those are?”

“The best outta all is Uchiha Sasuke,” Sakura said, not bothering to show her feelings about her being on team with him, “and the worst is probably going to be Naruto.”

After a while of silence from her mother (that definitely didn’t feel like a while to Sakura), her mother said, “You’ll be in a precarious position then. As the teammate of the heir of a noble clan and the teammate of the last Uzumaki _and_ a Jinchūriki…

“I’ll have meetings arranged for your protection,” her mother added after a second of thinking.

“Allies, allies, allies?” Sakura quoted what her mother used to say often.

“Allies, allies, allies. You’ll also have double as many of your classes on court etiquette, strategy, and you’ll get a personal teacher of the shinobi arts.”

Sakura nodded, resigned to her fate. She planned to take a small trip to Yūmeyo to visit her cousins there, but that didn’t seem like happening anytime soon, what with all of these new classes.

Someone knocked on the door, and her mother spared her a glance before asking a “Who’s there?” and humming happily at the reply of “You know who,” of a gruff voice belonging to none other than the oyabun* Junichi.

Sakura knew that she should stand up and leave her mother to talk business with the oyabun herself, but curiosity didn’t let her do the rational thing. Instead, she stood up and walked over to her mother’s side. She didn’t know why her mind was screaming at her to stay, that this was important, but she knew that listening to her instincts was the best right now. She learned that a long time ago.

“Come in,” her mother shouted after she sent a look of pure curiosity to Sakura. She normally didn’t like meeting the head of the Yakuza. For reasons unknown to Harumi.

Sakura, soon enough, regretted her decision of staying oh-so much (“The job has been done Harumi.” “Thank you, Yunichi.” A warm smile), but she couldn’t leave, couldn’t show weakness, before her mother who planned _**murders**_ , before the man who murdered without no thought other than _**“How much will this pay me?”**_

As soon as the oyabun exited the office, Sakura stormed out of it, not even bothering to say a by-your-leave to her mother.

She stormed through the halls, to her room, threw herself into her bed, and cried her heart out, disgusted of herself.

•

The next two months — months Sakura was supposed to relax during; summer holidays and all — were full of interesting contrasts.

At home, she attended classes with teachers hired by her mother or classes that her mother herself taught her. Her mother also often dragged her on business trips (at least Sakura got to go to Yūmeyo this year; she may be disgusted with the city’s politics but she did love her family who lived there) or dinners (Did Sakura mention that she hated beings invited to dinners for purely political reasons? Because she did; she loved carefully choosing words, expressions, even the littlest, she loved playing the game as her mother called it, but she hated, hated the game).

The times that Sakura wasn’t busy because of all of those things, she took refuge in the Red. Most of the time, Sakura went to Red with Ino, or Naruto - and she loved those times, she loved ranting about her problems, her classes, her life, to her friends, but the other times were great too; she made a good friend of Mizuki who taught her many, _many_ things - it seemed that she was a former shinobi, although Mizuki never actually confirmed Sakura’s theory and Sakura was nice enough not to ask about it ( _ **she knew better than ask a resident of the Red about their former life**_ ).

If June was full of learning, then August was full of practical training. Her mother had her do the taxes of the clan and she also had Sakura do almost all of the diplomatic decisions of that month - Sakura sent letters, went to dinners, spoke cold and manipulative lies under the cover of the sweetest of smiles,…

And soon enough, September rolled around and suddenly she was standing before the classroom where she was to meet her team to be.

She breathed in.

She breathed out.

She walked into the classroom and saw who she expected (no, knew) that she would see: she saw the Uchiha heir, sitting next to a window in the corner of the room, looking as broody as ever, and she saw Naruto, who ran to her as soon as he saw that she was in the room (“I’m gonna prank our teacher,” he said, closing the door after her and going on his toes to reach the top of the door and to put a… shoe? there.”).

Sakura smiled — a strained smile, for sure, but a smile nonetheless — and walked over to the Uchiha after lecturing Naruto about why it is a bad idea to try to prank his new teacher.

“Hi,” she said, sitting down next to him.

He looked at her with an expression of annoyance? disgust? happiness? — honestly, Sakura had no idea what it was and didn’t even try to decode what the expression meant — and greeted her in return. If that grunt counted as a greeting, that is.

Sakura didn’t stop trying to socialise with the boy. She had a plan; she would annoy him into not interacting with her. “How are you doing on this fine day?”

He rolled her eyes at her vocabulary — it sounded way too reminiscent of The Dinner Which He Swore Not To Speak Of — and he would’ve replied with something sassy hadn’t a silver-haired man hadn’t walked into the room.

A silver-haired man who was caught in Naruto’s _Very_ Creative prank; the shoe (Sakura still wasn’t sure what exactly the thing was, and it’s not like she cared at all! ~~She totally, totally didn’t want to prank Hitomi like this. Not her, nope~~ ) dropped on his head and the string of curses that followed was an interesting one - an especially interesting one once you considered that a good half of them were inside jokes that only residents of Red knew.

Sakura thought to herself, _Maybe I’ll like this new teacher. He seems interesting._

•

It turned out that she did not like this new teacher.

_*Oyabun - yakuza boss_

_**A/N: Sorry if there were any weird grammatical mistakes, I haven't really edited this thing a lot.** _

**Author's Note:**

> Soo, I have no idea what this is tbh. I just needed to get to my daily NaNoWriMo goal, and I was stuck on my main WIP, so I did this.
> 
> ... fuck. I think I may have just started another multi chapter fic. Oops—


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